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HiLLlAEI), OF ALABAMA, 



MR. STANLY, OF NOJITH CAROLINA, 



DF.HYtREJ; 






m THE JIOU&^E 01'' RE'.FRIuSEW'lATlVliS, THUHSDAV. MARCH "> 1850. 



WASHINGTON : 

PRINTED AT THE CONGRESSIONAL GJLOBE OFFICE. 

1850, 



EXPLANATION-PERSONAL AND F'OLlT'lflU. 



The House being in Committee of the Whole on the state 
of the Union, (Mr. Boyd, of Kentucky, in the Chair,) and 
thft fioor having been yielded, for the purposes of explana- 
tion, to Messrs. Hillurd and Stanly— 

Mr. HILLIARD rose and fsaid: 

Mr. Chairman': The Methodist Episcopal 
Church, with which I have been connnecied since 
I attained manhood, devolves on certain of its 
members, engaged in the various pursuits of life, 
the duty of enforcing, occasionally in public, the 
religiou.s truths held" by that body of Christians. 
This duty has been devolved on me by thai 
church. I am not insensible to the criticism to 
which it subjects me; but such are my convictions 
in regard to the duty, that 1 have no purpose of 
relinquishing it, while I live. A sense of this re- 
ligious obligation, has restrained me on all occa- 
sions, in my intercourse with .society, from any 
departure from the most perfect courtesy. Since 
my connection with the Congress of the United 
States, I have habitually forborne to trespass on 
the rights, or even the feelings, of any of its mem- 
bers. If on any occasion I had done so from in- 
advertance, I should, when reminded of it, have 
promptly repaired the wrong. My self-respect, 
as well as a sen.se of justice, dictated this course; 
and that I have uniformly adhered to it, is well 
known to gentlemen with whom I have had the 
honor to serve on this floor for years past. I may 
safely appeal to gentlemen on both sides of the 
chamber to sustain me in this statement. 

On the other hand, I have at all times supposed 
that no gentleman would allow himself to allude 
in any offensive sense to my religious profession. 
There exists a strong disposition in vulgar minds 
to do this, but I believe that no one has so far vio- 
lated the rules of decorum as to do so, with two 
exceptions. 

A member from Pennsylvania, who addressed 
the committee some days since, [Mr. Stevkvs,] 
felt himself at liberty to urge me to call on my 
illustrious friend, as he styled the President of the 
United States, and announce to him, in inspired 
language, his impending doom. He selected the 
very language which I was to utter in the ear of the 
President, " Accursed is the man stealer;" and I 
was to add to this a solemn entreaty to him to 
abandon his slave property, if he desired to e.scape 
the Divine wrath. I shall not offer a single remark 
in regard to the offensiveness of this language, in 
its application to the Chief Magistrate of the na- 
tion, or to myself as a member of this House; but 
shall leave it to that prompt condemnation which 



it will meet from every man who has any ju.sl 
sense of propriety. 

The other exception to which 1 refer, is the 
member from North Carolina, who spoke yester- 
day. That member thought proper to charge me, 
without a single provocation, on my part, with 
" desecrating the Scriptures, by quotations from 
them, urging the citizens of the United States to 
shed each other's blood;" and he proceeded, far- 
ther, to charge me witli a design to break up this 
Union. These charges were gratuitously made ; 
it was not my purpose, to interfere with the mem- 
ber, in the course of his speech. His vei-y gross 
allusion to me, drew from me an unpremeditated 
and indignant denial. Gross as the assault upon 
me was — none could be more so — I should have 
replied to it in less offensive language. A mo- 
ment's reflection would have enabled me to do so, 
but my indignation was, for the moment, irrepress- 
ible. I pronounced it "false," as it most cer- 
tainly was. Still, sir, however little respect was 
due to the member who could bring v^gainst me 
such an atrocious charge, I ought to have checked 
an indignation, which, however natural it is to 
feel under such an outrage, impelled mc to make 
a harsher reply than I could have desired to make, 
in a cooler moment. But, sir, it was an impulse 
which every generous man will at once understand 
and excuse. 

In looking around this arena, Mr. Chairman, 
the member had a perfect right to .^el^'ct his ad- 
versary: but however much the world may applaud 
the dis'crelion with which the member exercised his 
right in singling me out, it will not be likely to 
award him an ovation for any success which he 
may win in the contest. He thought it proper — 
perhaps I should say prudent— lo pass by all 
others, and tothrow hisgauntlet immediatelyatmy 
feet, as he entered the gladiatorial ring— at the 
moment in which he referred to me in a manner 
which almost every other member of the House, 
but himself, would have felt should shield me from 
a-ssault. I repeat, sir, the world may applaud the 
member's discretion, whatever it may say of his 
manliness. 

Now, sir, I deny that 1 have on any occasion 
employed the Scriptures for the purpose which the 
member charges on me. Indeed, I have never 
drawn upon them, as I remember, tor any pur- 
pose whatever, in the debates of this House. I 
have never sought to vindicate slavery by a single 
quotation from them. In my late speech, I ex- 
pressly declined to argue the question affecting the 



rights of the people represented by me, in respect I 
to slavery, on moral grounds; because the argu- j 
ment would admit the jurisdiction of the forum; 
and 1 urged none but political considerations in 
support of those rights. 

Much less, sir, have 1 at any time sought to 
bring the authority of the sacred volume to the 
support of violent measures. I distinctly and em- 
phatically repei the charge. Let my speech be 
examined, and it will be found that the charge of 
the member from North Carolina is without even 
the coloring of truth. It was, I am confident, hast- 
ily uttered. It proceeded from the unbalanced 
character of that member's mind, and his malig- j 
nant disposition toward southern members who : 
might be supposed ready to condemn his extraor- .. 
dinary course at this critical conjuncture. If I had ■, 
thought proper to search the Scriptures for guid- j 
ance at this time, I am quite sure that I should j 
have found nothing in them to encourage an aban- j 
donment of duty by one who is entrusted by his ; 
constituents with the high functions of a repre- '■' 
sentative; nor to favor a treasonable surrender, on ! 
his part, of the rights which he was chosen to 
uphold and defend. I am here as the rcpresenta- m 
live of others. Their rights are committed to my i 
keeping. Whatever I inay encounter, I shall vig- ; 
orously and faithfully contend for those rights. I j 
find nothing in human or Divine teachings, to en- i 
courage nie to do otherwise. On tlie contrary, if j 
I could shrink from their maintenance, because of 
any apprehension of encountering opposition from i 
the open enemies or false friends of those rights, I 
should incur the censure of liie whole Christian 
and political world. In my late speech, 1 made a | 
single brief quotation from the Scriptures, the ; 
object of which could not be tortured to mean : 
what the member has charged, but asserted what ; 
every one must admit to be true, thttt in a constitu- j 
ticnal government, political truth, like revealed 
truth, must be open to the freest discussion — a 1 
right denied only by a despotic government — 
which enforces tranquillity i)y the crushing might i 
of power — and formidable only to tyrants and to i 
traitors. | 

The other charge brought by the member, in ; 
his heedless manner, as to my disposition to break ; 
up the Union, is also without nny foundation in 
fact. It is an error into which he has fallen from i 
the present temper of his mind, which inclines him ' 
to suspect every southern man, who says a word in 
behalf of his section, of hostility to the Union. All ; 
such members, Jie undertakes to arraign and ' 
censure. 

I challenge him or any other member of this ^ 
House to produce a single remark of mine which 
favors the scheme of disunion. No man living is 
more profoundly devoted to the Union than 1 am. ; 
We owe to it our prosperity, our power, and our 
glory. Its destruction would involve our own j 
country in irretrievable ruin, and it would spread 
dismay through the ranks of the friends of liberty j 
in every part of the world. 

So far trom looking to its disruption as a remedy 
for political evils, I would put my life in peril, at 
any hour, to save it. To my vision, it seems to i 
be invested with dangers. I have pointed them | 
out; I have appealed earnestly to the patriotism of j 
this body to save the Union, by a wise, just, and j 
noble use of power. This would avert impend- 
ing troubles, while it would insure, for the whole I 



country, a glorious future. It would strengthen 
the Union. 1 claim to be as true a friend to the 
Union as the member from North Carolina. We 
difler in this: I stand with my people; he takes 
occasion, at this conjuncture, when his section is 
threatened, by the overv/helming power of a ma- 
jority, to approach the feet of power, and to give 
it whatever aid his abilities, or his position, may 
enable him to furnish. He spoke of the wrongs 
which his section has endured, in terms which 
were listened to with satisfaction only by those 
who oppose the very rights which he was sent 
here to uphold and vindicate. His course of re- 
mark could hardly fail to fill southern men with 
indignation, and even northern men with con- 
tempt. He goes over the whole field of contro- 
versy, and cannot find a single grievance of which 
the South has a right to complain — not even the 
disregard of the constitutional provision to sur- 
render fugitives from labor, which northern gen- 
tlemen themselves admit to be a wrong. He be- 
comes, indeed, the champion of the majority; in- 
vites them to press their measures, and threatens 
his own people, if they resist, with the military 
power of the Government. 

However ready I may be, on ail proper occa- 
sions, to do homage to the high qualities of the 
North, I cannot, at a. moment like this — when the 
whole strength of that powerful section of the Union 
is arrayed against the South — hesitate to take part 
v/ith the people, among whom Providence has cast 
my lot, in the great struggle through which they 
are now passing. Nor can I compreherid how any 
southern man — acquainted with the history of his 
country, familiar with the wrongs to which the 
South has been subjected, in regard to the question 
now before Congress— can, for a moment, forget, 
or forsake, the cause of that generous and gallant 
people. The nobler sympathies of our nature — 
in the absence of all the obligations of patriotism — 
should impel us to range ourselves on the side of 
the feeble against the strong. The course of the 
member from North Carolina seems to me to out- 
I rage both; it does violence alike to the nobler im- 
pulses of our nature, and the dictates of patriot- 
i ism; and, whether it is considered in regard to me 
' or to his country, it is not likely to be commended 
for its elevation, its generosity, or its manliness. 

A gentleman from New York, [Mr. White,] 
v^ho sits before me, I observe intimates that he 
: approves the course of the gentleman from North 
\ Carolina, in coming to the aid of the North at this 
[ conjuncture, and says, that the gentleman from 
i North Carolina sees "things through the same me- 
dium that he does. That is more than I have 
charged; for the gentleman from New York has, 
on every occasion when a question came up aifect- 
ing the rights of the South, voted against the 
South. He has, on every occasion, from first to 
last, voted for the Wiimot proviso, and sustained 
Gott's resolution as to slavery in the District of 
: Columbia. 

These gentlemen, sir — the one coming from New 
i York, and the other from North Carolina — sent 
I here by constituencies so widely differing upon 
; this question, see things through the same me- 
dium ! 
i I thank the gentleman from New York for the 
! timely remark. He admits the extraordinary po- 
I sition of the member from Noith Carolina; and 
' he accounts for it by saying, that *' they see 



things through the same medium." Such are the 
commendations which a southern Representative 
receives when he lends himself to carry out the 
objects of northern power. 

Sir, when at home, I did what I could to allay 
sectional feeling. I spoke for the Union; I pointed 
CO its glorious ensign, floating in conscious pride 
over this broad continent, from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific, and borne by our adventurous seamen into 
all the waters of the globe. 1 urged the people 
who surrounded me, and to whom the wildest 
appeals were addressed by those who undertook 
"o ride me down, to cherish a patriotic regard for 
the whole country; and I a.ssured them that no act 
of aggression on their rights would be made by 
Congress, and that if it were attempted, the act 
would be arrested by the President of their 
choice. But, sir, standing here, in the midst of 
the Representatives of other States, I have felt it 
to be my duty, to resist every measure which 
would be regarded by the people, for whom I 
speak, as an encroachment on their rights or their 
honor, and to urge upon this great body, repre- 
.«enting the whole country, the views which they 
entertain of a question which so deeply affects 
them. To have done otherwise, would, in my 
judgment, have been a gross abandonment of duty 
— duty to my immediate constituents, and to my 
whole country. While I have thus aimed to do 
my duty here faithfully and efficiently, I have in 
my correspondence with those I represent, con- 
tributed what I could to encourage a sound senti- 
ment at home — to repress, rather than to excite 
dissatisfaction. I have stated my hope in the just 
action of Congress, and my confidence in the 
President. I have discouraged all movements 
toward effecting a sectional organization, be- 
lieving that an occasion would not arise, calling 
for any other means of redress, than those which 
the forms of the Government afford. In the early 
part of the session, when it was impossible to fore- 
see what would be done, I joined my colleagues in 
addressing a letter to the Governor, in the hope, 
that the real sentiment of the people of Alabama 
would be uttered in firm and moderate resolutions 
'>n the part of the Legislature, and that the Ex- 
ecutive of the State would be empowered, in the 
event of a serious aggression being made by this 
Government upon their rights, to bring the sub- 
ject before the people themselves, to decide upon 
it, as they alone have the right to do. 

Such, sir, has been my course, adopted under a 
high sense of duty. My aim has been to main- 
tain the rights of the people represented by me, 
and, at the same time, to avert from the Union 
every cause of trouble — so little do I deserve to 
be classed with those who desire to break up the 
Union. God grant that it may out-ride every 
storm ! 

It is not to be denied, that those who represent 
ti feeble section, must sometimes appear to be im- 
practicable. Their constituents depend, for their 
jsecurity, upon a strict observance of the organic 
'aw. This they must insist upon; it may put them 
m conflict with a majority ; their firmness may even 
'.hreaten shocks to the sy.-item; but they must hold 
their position — for when they abandon it, they sur- 
render the rights, which they were appointed to 
acuard, to the unchecked dominion of power. This 
Government, without tbeConstitution, wouldbe an 
absolute despotism. 



Those of us who have contended for the rights 
of the southern people, and have demanded for 
them the protection of the Government, may be 
denounced for a time — traitors may assail us — the 
surges will dash against us; — but when the storm 
is gone by, and the great question now before us 
is settled, reason and truth will reassert their do- 
minion, and will vindicate us against the charge 
of faction. It will then be seen how much we 
have contributed to restore the action of the Gov- 
ernment to its true course, and that determined re- 
sistance to aggression is the only effectual mode 
of maintaining conservative principles. 

In our contests here, sir, this must be borne in 
mind. In the language of Edmund Burke, " sonic- 
thing must be allowed to the spirit of liberty." I 
shall do my duty; no considerations shall deter 
me from it — no reproaches can discourage — no 
threats can intimidate me. Harmony can only 
be maintained throughout this wide-spread Repub- 
lic by a wise, patriotic, and noble use of power. 
The people in every part of it must feel that their 
rights are protected. To wield the power of the 
Government, either to enrich one section at the ex- 
pense of another, or to destroy the securities which 
protect the property of every portion of the peo- 
ple, must give rise to dissatisfaction; and if the 
wrong be heavy enough, it will occasion angry 
and even fatal convulsions. The right of revolu- 
tion resides in every people under Heaven; and 
there are wrongs which will drive them to the ex- 
ercise of it, unless they are already fit to be made 
slaves. No people, who comprehend and iove 
liberty, will bear too heavy a pressure from power. 
He icho stands ready, as the representative of a free 
people, to surrender their rights to the demands of 
potoer, and to proclaim that no xorongs can drive them 
into resistance to their Government, is already dead to 
the noble impulses which can alone preserve liberty. 

If, sir, this Union could be maintained by force 
— if it could exist after the whole power of the 
Government came to be employed against the 
property of the people of one half of the States — 
what generous or right minded man, come from 
what section he may, would not prefer to main- 
tain it by a just exercise of the political functiotia 
which he holds — by a magnanimous forbearance in 
the use of strength — than by military power? 

Sir, this Union can be perpetuated — not by 
force — not by bayonets — but by cherishing the 
spirit which gave it its existence, and by a rigid 
adherence to the Constitution. I take this occa- 
sion to say, that I ask for no amendment to the 
Constitution; let it stand; let it be observed in let- 
ter and spirit. May it be perpetual ! I do not 
desire to throw any additional obstacles in the 
way of a speedy settlement of the great question 
now pending. I earnestly desire to see itdisposed of 
in a spirit which will inspire fresh confidence in the 
Government, and give new strength to the Union. 

The member from North Carolina, in his ex- 
traordinary speech yesterday, did not content him- 
self with inviting us to accompany him to the 
tomb of Washington, whither we should all have 
gone as willing pilgrims ; but he alluded to Jack- 
son, in such terms, as to revive party animosities, 
which have hardly yet had time to die out, and 
which, at this moment especially, ought not to 
be revived. He spoke of his exertions for the 
preservation of the Union, and of the menaces 
' which, at a certain period of our country's hia- 



\*l 



tory, he had uttered. He then passed to the 
President of the United States, and hoped that the 
same special Providence which had preserved the 
hves of the two illustrious men already alluded to, 
would keep him; and that he, too, might be able, 
in spite of all resistance, to save the Union. How 
would that gentleman wi.sh him to preserve it? 
Uy military power? By the exercise of his great 
abilities as a military leader ? Sir, I greatly miscon- 
ceive the character of the President, if he would 
not infinitely prefer to sjerve his country, and to 
save the Union, by employing pacific measures, 
than by an appeal to arms. JVly confidence in the 
President is unlimited. Recognizing in him great 
qualities, which fitted him, as I believed, for a 
faithful and eflicient performance of Executive 
trusts I contributed, what I could, to secure his 
nomination at Philadelphia. I had the impression 
that the member from North Carolina was op- 
posed to it. He now informs me that he was not, 
out aided to bring it about. I, with pleasure, ac- 
cept his statement of the fact, and thank him — at 
least, for that. 

He says, however, that he was not in a Method- 
ist Church in that city. If he had .sometimes 
visited such places, his morals and his manners 
would probably both be better than they are to- 
day. The remark only discloses the incurable 
proneness of the member to a line of conduct, 
whicii must prove far more injurious to him than 
it can possibly be to others. 



As my position puts it out of my power to ap- 
peal to the only considerations which seem to be 
potential in holding him to the observance of a de- 
cent demeanor, I must, of course, expect to hear 
from him the rudest remarks which his nature ca.i 
suggest. No one will be at a loss to account for 
such a display of his spirit. 

I was observing, sir, that my confidence in the 
President, so far from being diminished by a per- 
sonal knowledge of him, has gained strength. {, 
too, look to him in this great crisis. The laurek 
which encircle hie brow, have been nobly earned ; 
he does not desire to have them crimsoned with 
fraternal blood. History has already claimed his 
military achievements for the brightest pages in 
which she records great exploits. I earnestly 
hope that the influence of his high station, and his 
great character, will, through all his future days, 
be thrown on the side of peace; that the eveniro^ 
of his life may be crowned with even more glo- 
rious trophies than war has yielded hi.m; that his 
administration will be illustrated by an unswerving 
adherence to the Constitution; byafirm protection 
of the rights of the weak, whensoever they are 
threatened by the power of the strong; and that 
his country will hereafter rank him with her bene- 
factors, less on account of the victories which he 
ha.s won in the field, than for the triumphs which 
yet await him in a wise, just, and noble per- 
formance of the duties of the great office, to which 
he has been c.'illed by the American people. 



4® 



